danah boyd, a professor at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for the Internet and Society, argues that teenagers closely scrutinize what they share online because it is a way for them to negotiate their changing identities. In her book, It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens, she describes how teenagers carefully curate their feeds based on the audience they are trying to reach.

Adolescents have been migrating away from Facebook and Twitter over the last few years, showing preference for sites like Snapchat, Whisper, Kik, and Secret that provide more anonymity and privacy. Part of this transition can be explained by the fact that the older social media sites stopped being cool when parents joined them, but perhaps another reason could be that teenagers growing up in the post-Snowden era implicitly understand the value of anonymity. For teens, it’s not a matter of which platform to use, but rather which works best in a particular context.

The Four Stages of Moving from Traditional to Online Teaching

In this stage the teacher takes on traditional lecture-style teaching and hasn’t yet implemented any online or blended learning strategies.

2. Stranger in a Strange Land:

Next, the teacher becomes a Stranger in a Strange Land, as instruction moves to the computer, and the computer becomes the primary instructional tool. At this stage, the teacher is still unsure of how they fit in but is experimenting with and utilizing online tools to enhance instruction.

3. Resource:

As the teacher continues to evolve, they enter the Resource stage, and while the computer is still the primary instructional tool, the teacher is comfortable being a resource, answering questions and re-teaching when asked.

Do Digital Natives Really Exist?

it’s an accurate depiction of the current generation of students? No one is born with knowledge. Everything is learned through environment and practice, so maybe it’s time to reexamine long held assumptions about students’ relationships to technology.